Fab City gives B'lore thumbs down

Fab City gives B'lore thumbs down
Vijay Times

Bangalore: The ’IT Capital of India’ has apparently lost the race for establishing the country’s first F ab City for a semiconductor plant manufacturing silicon chips, with Hyderabad being chosen for the project.

Union Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran announced here on Thursday that the F ab City project with $ 2b (Rs 9,000 cr) investment was awarded to Hyderabad after a close fight between Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The prestigious project is expected to generate emplo yment for at least 15 lakh people.

Maran said while T amil N adu lost the race due to a lukewarm response, Hyderabad scored points o ver Bangalore in pro viding subsidies and infrastructure facilities like land, water and electricity to SemIndia, which would set up the F ab City .

P olitical uncertainty and inability to take a quick decision on pro viding infrastructure facilities appear to have cost Karnataka dearly . SemIndia representatives had met the then Chief Minister Dharam Singh recently , but apart from a vague assurance to pro vide land near Bidadi, nothing else mo ved.

SemIndia, a consortium of overseas Indians, had said in No vember 2005 that it planned to invest $ 3b in a semiconductor manufacturing facility in India with technology from US-based Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), but had not announced the location then.

Under an agreement signed in December 2005, AMD agreed to transfer microprocessor technology to SemIndia.

Maran said the Centre was only a facilitator in setting up F ab City plants in India and would soon come up with a strategy on dealing with issues concerning such plants in the country .

H e said the vision for the future saw the semiconductor sector emerging as a po werhouse to drive India’s economic growth, generating nearly 36 lakh jobs by 2015. Bangalore: Putting up a brave face, State I BT Secretary M K Shankaralinge Gowda said o Thursday that the State government would mak fresh bid to get the F ab City to Bangalor Vijay Times, he claimed that the State had agreed the demands made by the promoters of the F and even sent a letter to the Centre in t the Centre has not replied to our letter ," he sai prise at the announcement of the project go said, "W e are going to ask the promoters facilities they want. At the same time, we are goi ring Hyderabad over Bangalore. W e will respond ac

Why Karnataka lost the race

Hyderabad: Karnataka lost out the race to H to get F ab City project because it failed to prov quate infrastructure facilities like land, wa president and CEO of SemIndia Vinod Agarwal Thursday . The work on the project for begin next month, he added. AP Chief Minist reporters that the State government had allocated greenfield airport near Shamshabad.

State to make fresh bid



WHAT S FAB CITY? A project floated by SemIndia, a consortium of overseas Indians, investing $ 3b for manufacturing silicon chips

WHAT IS LOST : Jobs for 15 lakh people

WHY : State couldn’t provide assurances on infrastructure facilities